The V60’s pre-crash front seatbelts will tighten automatically in the event the vehicle detects an impending crash, improving protection against injury significantly. The Impreza doesn’t offer pre-crash pretensioners.
Both the V60 and Impreza have child safety locks to prevent children from opening the rear doors. The V60 has power child safety locks, allowing the driver to activate and deactivate them from the driver's seat and to know when they're engaged. The Impreza’s child locks have to be individually engaged at each rear door with a manual switch. The driver can’t know the status of the locks without opening the doors and checking them.
The V60 has standard Post-impact braking, which automatically apply the brakes in the event of a crash to help prevent secondary collisions and prevent further injuries. The Impreza doesn’t offer a post collision braking system: in the event of a collision that triggers the airbags, more collisions are possible without the protection of airbags that may have already deployed.
Over 200 people are killed each year when backed over by motor vehicles. The V60 has standard CTA Auto Brake that uses rear sensors to monitor for objects to the rear and automatically applies the brakes to prevent a collision. The Impreza doesn’t offer backup collision prevention brakes.
The V60 has a standard 360° Camera to allow the driver to see objects all around the vehicle on a screen. The Impreza only offers a rear monitor.
The V60 has a standard blind spot warning system that uses sensors to alert the driver to objects in the vehicle’s blind spots where the side view mirrors don’t reveal them and moves the vehicle back into its lane. A system to reveal vehicles in the Impreza’s blind spot costs extra.
To help make backing out of a parking space safer, the V60 has standard Cross Traffic Alert and Braking Intervention automatically engages the brakes to help avoid a collision. Subaru charges extra for Rear Cross Traffic Alert on the Impreza and its not available on the Base and the Impreza’s Rear Cross Traffic Alert does not include automatic braking.
Both the V60 and the Impreza have standard driver and passenger frontal airbags, front side-impact airbags, driver knee airbags, side-impact head airbags, front and rear seatbelt pretensioners, height adjustable front shoulder belts, four-wheel antilock brakes, all wheel drive, traction control, electronic stability systems to prevent skidding, crash mitigating brakes, daytime running lights, lane departure warning systems and rearview cameras.
The Volvo V60 weighs 1172 to 1328 pounds more than the Subaru Impreza. The NHTSA advises that heavier cars are much safer in collisions than their significantly lighter counterparts.
For its top level performance in IIHS driver and passenger-side small overlap frontal, moderate overlap frontal, side impact, roof strength and head restraint tests, its standard vehicle-to-vehicle front crash prevention system, with its optional vehicle-to-pedestrian front crash prevention system, and its standard headlight’s “Good” rating, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety grants the V60 its highest rating: “Top Safety Pick Plus” for 2022, a rating granted to only 131 vehicles tested by the IIHS. The Impreza has not been fully tested, yet.